Makaya McCraven's Ibanez EX

Sticking with the theme of drummers and purple ibanez basses… here is Makaya McCraven's purple P/J Ibanez.  I had a rehearsal a couple weeks back with Makaya and mentioned that I would love to take a crack at fixing this one up.  He agreed and told me he wanted flats and for it to play and sound more like a P Bass.

First thing I noticed was the nut had some pieces of what looked like toilet paper wedged under the string (work courtesy of the one and only Josh Ramos I hear.  Next time use aluminum foil).  So obviously the nut slot was cut too low.  I tried to pop the nut out to shim it and unfortunately broke it in the process.  So this one got a new nut (with some serious help from my good friend Carl Pedigo)

Next thing I noticed was that this thing had some serious mojo built up on it.  So I went thru the usual process of cleaning everything.  Wiping down the board to remove the funk and hitting it with a little Howards Feed N Wax.  Then I noticed that the back of the neck had some pretty serious gunk build up.    You can see it in the discolored areas in the pic.

So to remedy that I went at the back of the neck with a grey scotch brite pad for a few minutes until it was gone.  Then I hit the back of the neck with some Howards as well.

Plugged it in and noticed the tone knob wasn't working at all.  Opened up the cavity and found out why

Capacitor was not hooked up correctly, plus the 2nd volume pot was wired straight to the jack.  Re-wired everything and replaced the battery and the foam around the battery in the cavity.

Then I strung it up with the flats and gave it a setup all around.  

Good as new (almost…)

 8.  Makaya McCraven's Ibanez EX bass
- Replaced Nut
- "De-Gunked" finish on back of neck
- Re wired electronics
- New strings (flats), setup, cleaned, tightened hardware